PODCAST · tv
Pop DNA
by Rhonda Watts and Erin O'Loughlin
Pop DNA traces the roots of your favorite pop culture works. We're Erin and Rhonda, and we are big old nerds. We love dissecting our favorite movies, TV shows, and more, and we're really into how literature, history, and culture have impacted the works we consume. We explore connections across mediums, from the classic novels we see reflected in our favorite horror movies, to the politics in superhero franchises, to the influence of Shakespeare in, like, literally everything. There are also bad jokes. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram!
Episodes
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The Mount Rushmore of Public Domain Halloween Monsters | Vampire Summer
We're getting further down the vampire funnel into allegory and metaphor--what do vampires MEEEEEAAANN??? We start with some historical medical cases that give insight into what people in the past thought of vampires, with the case of Mercy Brown, and an explainer on the vampire-adjacent Chinese...
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This Episode Sucks | Vampire Summer
Stake it or leave it, this is our summer series! We decided to spend our summer deep diving into vampire lore and the ever evolving role of the undead in popular fiction. In our first installment, we define our terms and talk a little about the folklore origins of vampire stories. We also take a...
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BONUS: Rhonda Wrote a Book and We Talked About It!
Pop DNA scored an exclusive early interview with up-and-coming debut author Rhonda Watts for an intimate, no-holds-barred interview. Rhonda's debut cozy fantasy book, Spells & Sensibility, is currently on submission, so no spoilers or big news yet, but she wanted to talk about it with her friend...
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The Lord of the Rings (Revisited): Cute Y2K Hairstyles for Uruk Hai Warriors
Rhonda is still in her Medievalist Era and making it everyone's problem, and Erin just wants to talk about some creatures, so you could say this is a typical Pop DNA episode. We continue our exploration of LOTR's relationship to medievalism in pop culture with a look at the beloved Medieval Y2K...
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The Lord of the Rings (Revisited): A MODieval Middle Earth
The Medieval Revival of the 1960s and '70s coincided and communicated closely with the LOTR books' surge in popularity at that time. Hippies and other sects of 1960s counterculture adopted the Shire and the Hobbits as their own, and produced expressions of art and culture that Tolkien was really...
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The Lord of the Rings (Revisited): Let's Do a Medievalism
This episode is all about how the Victorian era's culture and politics shaped J. R. R. Tolkien and, by extension, the world of Middle Earth. We start with a look at the Grotesque vs. the Romantic Middle Ages as defined by medievalist David Matthews, and how each approach was at play in the late...
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The Lord of the Rings (Revisited): At Home in the Shire
Remember when we tried to have a comprehensive discussion of The Lord of the Rings in one 55-minute episode? Turns out there's a lot more to it. In this introduction to our LOTR (Revisited) series, we take a quiz to find out which characters we are, get on a soapbox about how adaptations and…
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BONUS: The Best of 2025!
It's that time of year again! We came back from our long hiatus to talk about our favorite TV and movies of 2025, plus a few books, and a few things that were NOT our favorite. First we had to spend a good chunk of time talking about all our feelings on Wicked: For Good, or should we call it......
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REGIFTING! The Wizard of Oz: The Politics Behind the Curtain
Wicked: For Good has officially been released into the world! To celebrate, we are regifting one of our episodes on The Wizard of Oz in which we discussed Wicked. We talked about other adaptations of the 1900 novel, as well, including the 1939 film and the musical The Wiz, focusing on how each…
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Sex and The City: It's Finally Over
We are finally done talking about Sex and the City! We conclude our discussion with an examination of Miranda and Charlotte as foils of one another, and through the lens of archetypes rather than fully developed characters, branching off from our talk last episode about the theory of the three...
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Sex and the City: 'Tis Pity She's a Wh*re
This episode's title comes from the 1626 play by English dramatist John Ford, because we are very smart. And turns out, it kinda fits for discussing SATC's apparent attitude toward Samantha Jones. We dive into Sam's key romantic relationships to explore how her attitude toward sex and dating was...
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Sex and the City: Men are Like Plants
Is Sex and the City a feminist text? That's the question we sort of attempt to answer in this episode, but ultimately we find it more interesting to talk about Sabrina Carpenter's 2025 album Man's Best Friend and the 2009 romcom film He's Just Not That Into You starring Ginnifer Goodwin. Our...
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Sex and the City: We Couldn't Help But Wonder...
Heads' up that we had several forms of technical difficulties with recording this episode, so apologies in advance for any subpar sound quality! Are we ever ready to talk about Sex and the City? Unclear, but we're going to. In part 1 of our SATC series, we discuss some general thoughts on the HBO...
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Millennial Falcon | Episode I: The Phantom Romance
Welcome to our slightly unhinged summer series, Millennial Falcon! This three-part series is all about the fandoms we've never felt like we were truly a part of until the past few years, our Millennial Falcons, if you will. For Rhonda, that's romance novels, and for Erin it's Star Wars. In our...
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The Office: Mockumentary Now!
In the finale of our The Office series and of our regular season, we look at the show's ties to popular media that came both before and after. Erin did a deep dive into the history of the mockumentary, and you won't believe what the first one was! We also discuss some well-known mockumentary…
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The Office: Workplace Romance
In part four of our discussion of The Office, we dive in to the various romance storylines the show featured, and how we feel about them! From the classic sitcom "will-they-or-won't-they" tension between Jim and Pam, to Michael and Holly's second chance romance, to the hilariously toxic...
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The Office: How to Be Likeable
“Do I need to be liked? Absolutely not. I like to be liked. I enjoy being liked. I have to be liked. But it's not like this compulsive need to be liked, like my need to be praised.” –Michael Scott Likeability plays a huge role in how characters on The Office relate to one another, and how we as…
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The Office: A Dystopian Workplace
Despite its undercurrent of warmth and optimism, The Office (US) went to some pretty dystopian places in its explorations of the workplace--which were really just reflections of the boring dystopia of our reality. In this episode, we look at how The Office fits within the context of Workplace...
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The Office: Orientation Packet
If you've ever listened to us trade The Office references on the pod and thought, "why don't they just talk about The Office already?" this new series is for you! In your orientation packet, you'll find an overview of our thoughts on the American series in comparison with the original British...
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BONUS: The Best of 2024!
Our yearly tradition of discussing our favorite movies and TV, plus a little music and books, is back! We had every intention of talking about Wickiator/Glicked, but there's really no story there. There's Wicked, which we talked about for far longer than we intended because we had so many…
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REGIFTING! A Christmas Prince
Check your Christmas ornaments, there might be important documents inside! Please enjoy this regifted episode from 2019 about the Netflix Christmas Cinematic Universe, specifically A Christmas Prince. ORIGINAL DESCRIPTION: Honestly, this episode was a long time coming. A Christmas Prince is rich…
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REGIFTING! The Chronicles of Narnia: Battles are Ugly When Women Fight
We have another regifted episode for you this week! We couldn't choose between our two Narnia episodes, so we're regifting both! This episode from December of 2022 touches on gender and violence, and how children experience fear and danger in fantasy worlds, all themes we explored in our A Song…
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REGIFTING! The Chronicles of Narnia: Deeper Magic from Before the Dawn of TIme
Happy December! We are taking a much-needed break to enjoy the holiday season, but thought we'd take the opportunity to revisit some of our previous episodes this month. It's Regifting Time! This episode from our Chronicles of Narnia series in December of 2022 explores the topics of magic, magic...
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A Song of Ice and Fire: The Chosen One Problem
Why do so many fantasy stories center on the protagonist fulfilling a "Chosen One" prophecy? We don't really answer that this week, but we do talk about the undercurrent of prophecy in Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon, the "Song of Ice and Fire" that this universe is named for. We also…
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A Song of Ice and Fire: in da clurb, we all fam
In Westeros, when you're here, you're family. Oh, wait, that's The Olive Garden. But we're talking about families this week, and, like most things in Westeros, being part of a family is generally not a great time for anyone in this world. Certainly not as fun as having dinner at The Olive Garden....
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A Song of Ice and Fire: I'm Just Jon
He's just Jon and he's enough! (Jonough?) This week we're talking about men in Westeros, exploring how masculinity is constructed in the world of Game of Thrones. Questions we discuss include: How do medieval European ideals of masculinity inform this world's gender expectations? What is the...
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A Song of Ice and Fire: Maiden, Mother, #GirlBoss
In part two of our series discussing Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon, we look at how women navigate the world of Westeros. Questions we explore include: How do women gain, lose, and use power in this world? How does power relate to femininity? How are the expected gender roles of…
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A Song of Ice and Fire: Welcome to Westeros
Welcome back! We're riding our dragons to King's Landing for a six-part series on A Song of Ice and Fire and all its connected works, including the TV series Game of Thrones and House of the Dragon. This week, we're just getting our feet wet with a look at our first introductions to George R. R....
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Dune | Book-to-Screen Club
We wrap up our summer book-to-screen club series with the science fiction classic that inadvertently sparked a thousand sandworm popcorn bucket memes. Our discussion topics include Dune's influence on and connections to other staples of the science fiction and fantasy genres such as Star Wars,...
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The Color Purple | Book-to-Screen Club
Continuing our discussions of classic American novels, this week we read Alice Walker's The Color Purple! We talk about how the novel explores girlhood and relationships between women, the Black experience in the early 20th century, and finding the joy in life even through darkness. We also look…
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Little Women | Book-to-Screen Club
Welcome to our 2024 Summer Series! This summer we decided to read some classic American novels with recent film adaptations, and we're starting with Little Women by Louisa May Alcott. We talk about our personal experiences with the novel, how we see this work in the context of American…
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BONUS! Tayoncé: Cowboys, Poets, and the Golden Age of Women in Pop
For Rhonda's Birthday Bonus we're talking COWBOY CARTER and THE TORTURED POETS DEPARTMENT. Why are both of these albums' titles styled in all caps? Our conversation explores our initial reactions to and top five tracks from each album, as well as some interesting parallels between these two…
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Barbie: Who Are We Kidding? We're All Depression Barbie
If you thought we were going to let it slide that Depression Barbie's comfort show is the 1995 BBC Pride and Prejudice, you thought wrong. We're digging in to some possible literary inspirations and parallels for the Barbie movie, looking specifically at Christian/Catholic creation theology and…
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Barbie: When You Think of Sparkle, You Think of Female Agency.
We are back from a long, semi-unplanned hiatus, but don't worry, there's still plenty more Barbie to talk about! This week we look at how both Barbie Land and Stereotypical Barbie's perspective in the film explore gender and femininity. How does Barbie Land fit into the context of women-dominated...
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Barbie: Now I Am Become Irrepressible Thoughts of Death Barbie
Hi Barbies! We have sooooo much to talk about in this three-parter, so we squished some background discussion of fashion dolls and the cultural mythos of Barbie into this first episode. We also have some thoughts on the Barbenheimer phenomenon, the Barbie movie as a capitalist product, and our…
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The Last of Us: The Illusion of Choice
What was supposed to be a fun and light chat about video games this week turned into a philosophical discussion of free will as a player of video games, and how this illusion of choice translates into the choices (or lack thereof) of characters in the TV series of The Last Of Us, especially in...
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The Last of Us: The End of the World As We Know It
This week we are getting apocalyptic! We talk about why we as humans seem to be fascinated with the fall of civilization or even of humanity itself. From the ancient epic of Gilgamesh to several separate HBO shows, our literature and culture are full of stories about humans at the end of the…
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The Last of Us: Is This a Zombie Show?
Welcome to our first regular episode of 2024! We're kicking the year off with a discussion of the (maybe?) zombie show that everyone was talking about in early 2023. This week we talk about our first experiences with the world of The Last of Us, discuss the question of whether or not this is in...
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BONUS: The Best of 2023!
It's a new year, which means it's time for us to talk about our favorite movies and TV (plus a little theater and music) of 2023! We also discuss how the Hollywood strikes affected how we view media, and how the theme of girlhood seemed to be a throughline in a lot of the media we loved this past...
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The Wizard of Oz: The Politics Behind the Curtain
The Wizard of Oz is a quintessentially American story, and over the 120+ years since the novel's release, the tale and its subsequent iterations have reflected the political climate of particular moments in our culture. From its inception as an alleged allegory for the late 19th century Populist...
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The Wizard of Oz: Leaving Kansas
We're wrapping up 2023 with a look at the beloved 1939 classic musical fantasy film The Wizard of Oz, and its 1900 source novel by L. Frank Baum. This week we give you a wizard's-eye view of the topics we plan to dig into deeper in the next couple episodes. We'll look at the popular theory of the...
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The Hunger Games (Revisited): Nobody Ever Wins the Games
Following up on our conversation from last time, this installment in our discussion of The Hunger Games looks at the vulnerability of children in both Panem and the ongoing attacks on Palestine, the troubling parallel between the Capitol citizens of Panem and we in the privileged Western world in...
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The Hunger Games (Revisited): Turns Out We're the Capitol :/ featuring Jac Frost
With a new installment of The Hunger Games film franchise hitting theaters this month, we thought this would be the perfect opportunity to revisit the series, and we brought a friend! Jac Frost (known as @jacfrostisreal on TikTok) joins us for an intro to the deep-dive discussions we're planning…
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BONUS! Commentary: Addams Family Values (1993)
Happy Halloween! As a coda to our Wednesday series, we decided to watch an iconic movie from our childhoods and talk over it! Tangents include the research Rhonda did about the house in Practical Magic before we visited the town where it was filmed for Galentine's Day, the summer camp Erin worked...
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Wednesday: Isn't it Woe-mantic
We wrap up our Wednesday series with a deep dive into the character's emotional landscape. The therapy sessions that Wednesday is compelled to attend are not a healthy depiction of mental health care, so let's talk about that! Let's also talk about whether or not romance was really necessary to...
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Wednesday: All Ghouls School
This week we're talking about the ways the titular Wednesday explores her identity throughout the series, from finding other weird kids at Nevermore Academy, to differentiating from the Addams Family ethos. Further Reading: Nevermore Academy website Nevermore filming locations The All Ghouls…
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Wednesday: Creepy, Kooky, Burtonesque
Wednesday is both a piece of Addams Family media and a Tim Burton work, so we're looking at the intersection of those two origins. We take a trip down memory lane to look at how Wednesday and the rest of her family have been portrayed in various media over the decades, from the original 1930s...
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Wednesday: Full of Woe
It's full-on Spooky Season at Pop DNA and we're celebrating with a discussion of our favorite spooky teen, Wednesday Addams! In part 1 of this series, we talk about some of our initial thoughts on the Netflix show Wednesday, our relationships with the Addams Family franchise, and how we feel...
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Abbott Elementary: The Comedy and Drama of Teaching
We wrap up our series on Abbott Elementary with some thoughts on how the show pays homage and stands out from older network sitcoms, Quinta Brunson's inspirations for the series, and a more lighthearted look at teaching and the veteran teachers who have shaped all of our lives. Further Reading:...
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Abbott Elementary: I Want My Mom
This week we're digging into some of our favorite characters on Abbott Elementary! We take a look at our favorite terrible boss Ava, with a psychological analysis of supervisor-employee relationship patterns, and how Ava's management style stacks up to other fictional bosses like Michael Scott or...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
Pop DNA traces the roots of your favorite pop culture works. We're Erin and Rhonda, and we are big old nerds. We love dissecting our favorite movies, TV shows, and more, and we're really into how literature, history, and culture have impacted the works we consume. We explore connections across mediums, from the classic novels we see reflected in our favorite horror movies, to the politics in superhero franchises, to the influence of Shakespeare in, like, literally everything. There are also bad jokes. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram!
HOSTED BY
Rhonda Watts and Erin O'Loughlin
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Pop DNA have?
Pop DNA currently has 211 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Pop DNA about?
Pop DNA traces the roots of your favorite pop culture works. We're Erin and Rhonda, and we are big old nerds. We love dissecting our favorite movies, TV shows, and more, and we're really into how literature, history, and culture have impacted the works we consume. We explore connections across...
How often does Pop DNA release new episodes?
Pop DNA publishes regularly with 211 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Pop DNA?
You can listen to Pop DNA on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Pop DNA?
Pop DNA is created and hosted by Rhonda Watts and Erin O'Loughlin.
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