The Willies - Episode 1: Crouching Ghosts & Bothersome Sausages

Episode Summary After a long hiatus since February, Damien and Lily are back with a brand-new name, a brand-new focus, and a slight technical mishap (apologies for the microphone blunder!). Goodbye A Series of Stupid Decisions, and hello to The Willies—a podcast dedicated to exploring the uncanny, the creepy, and the downright bizarre things that give us the chills. In this premier episode, the duo dives into the unsettling nature of human crouching, the culinary horror of an overly thick sausage skin, the macabre history of Victorian post-mortem photography, and the terrifying real-world science behind zombie ants.

Chapter Markers

• 00:00 - The Long-Awaited Return & Audio Apology Damien and Lily address their extended break since February and Damien confesses to a major microphone blunder.
• 01:30 - Saying Goodbye to A Series of Stupid Decisions Why focusing strictly on horror movie characters making bad choices became a chore, and how a signature sound from the movie Hereditary stuck with them.
• 03:10 - The Sweaty UK Heatwave & Unwritten Rules of the Restroom Surviving the intense summer heat and a tangent on why "sitting down" is a selfless act for men.
• 04:40 - Introducing the New Name: The Willies Damien shares the backstory of how he came up with the title, the struggle of finding a unique name, and Lily's childhood history with the word.
• 06:20 - Damien’s Creepy Thing: People Crouching An exploration of why people crouching on the balls of their feet is inherently unsettling, featuring the ghost boy from Sinister and Japanese horror icon Sadako.
• 09:10 - The Uncanny Valley & Glitch Movements in Horror Discussing the cinematic tricks that freak us out, from Jacob’s Ladder to birds-of-prey head tracking, and why slow-moving zombies trump rage zombies.
• 11:00 - Lily’s "Ick": The Bother some Jumbo Sausage Lily shares a disturbing sensory experience from her work summer party involving wooden cutlery and an incredibly thick, impenetrable hot dog skin.
• 13:10 - Flubbed Movie Scores: The Mummy vs. Evil Dead Rise A look at why Rotten Tomatoes got it wrong with Lee Cronin's The Mummy (which they loved) versus Evil Dead Rise (which Lily hated).
• 15:00 - The Macabre World of Victorian Post-Mortem Photography A dive into the 19th-century luxury of posing with deceased relatives, painting eyes on eyelids, and why the practice faded out by the 1930s.
• 19:25 - Zombie Ants: The Horror of Ophiocordyceps Damien explains the terrifying reality of the mind-controlling fungus that puppets ants, explodes their heads, and inspired The Last of Us.
• 23:05 - Technical Paranoia & The Happening Realizing mid-show that the mics are definitely off, and a quick nod to M. Night Shyamalan's The Happening and Smile.
• 24:40 - Listener Callout & Haunted School Trips How to submit your own creepy stories, and Lily's childhood memory of a portrait whose eyes followed her at Often Court.
• 26:40 - Collective Ghost Stories & Childhood Fears Lily shares a terrifying shared experience of hearing a phantom voice with her sister, and Damien recalls running from "red-haired monsters" on Winter Hill.
• 29:45 - Damien's Zombie Walk & Sign-Off Damien boasts about his perfected zombie walk simulation used to terrorize his wife, and the duo wraps up their first official episode of The Willies.

Links & Resources Mentioned:

• Horror Films: Hereditary, Sinister, The Ring (Ringu), Jacob's Ladder, The Mummy (Lee Cronin), Evil Dead Rise, The Happening, Smile.
• Video Games: The Last of Us.
• Historical Figures: Louis Pasteur & Robert Koch (The Germ Theory trailblazers).

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