This American Wife is a “public radio” podcast from producer Eric Martin. In 2011 it did several crossover episodes with the Thrilling Adventure Hour. The answers for the TAH characters that appeared in the crossover episodes were written by Acker and Blacker, and thus should probably be considered canonical.
Episodes were released on both the Thrilling Adventure Hour and This American Wife feeds, but the contents of the two were different. The full episode of This American Wife, available here, contains interviews with the following in-character pairs: Sparks Nevada and Croach the Tracker, Frank Doyle and Sadie Doyle, and Banjo Bindlestuff and Gummy. It also contains an interview with the Bens along with out-of-character segments with Paul F. Tompkins, Paget Brewster, Craig Cackowski, Hal Lublin, Marc Evan Jackson, and Mark Gagliardi. The out-of-character interview segments were not released on the TAH feed.
Interview with Sparks and Croach
This is a special episode of Sparks Nevada, Marshal on Mars recorded for This American Wife that was released as episode #38.1 of the Thrilling Adventure Hour. The episode is done in interview format, with in-character answers provided by Sparks Nevada and Croach.
Audio
"Interview with Sparks and Croach" on SoundCloud
Cast
- Sparks Nevada - Marc Evan Jackson
- Croach the Tracker - Mark Gagliardi
- Robert Segel - Eric Martin
- Melissa Block - Jen Goldberg
Description
Segel introduces Sparks and Croach and thanks them for being on the program.
Segel asks about Sparks being from Earth, and Sparks informs Segel Earth is the "best" planet. Sparks encourages Segel not to worry too much about Croach's onus.
Sparks is asked what made him decide to become a Marshal, and Sparks responds that his skills with a lasso, natural talent, love of righting wrongs, and ability to draw guns quickly all contributed.
Croach also explains that Mars is called G'loot Praktaw.
They then relate the story of how they met. John Steelhands melted the polar ice caps, which the humans had been freezing robot outlaws in. Croach's tribe was enjoying the feast after their younglings had survived the trials of of B’ar-mit zvah. Steelhands melted the polar ice caps to get to the robot outlaws, which created a flood. The flood was heading towards not only Croach's tribe's village during the celebration, but a human village as well.
Croach also explains how Martian signifiers work, and how each person in the tribe is the only Martian who does that job.
Getting back to the main story, Sparks tells how he hooked a wormhole generator to his lasso, and sent the flood through the wormhole, thus saving both the Martians and the human camp. As the entire tribe was under great onus to Sparks, Barlok the Wise, the chief of the tribe assigned Croach to Sparks for help tracking his metal enemies.
Croach explains how Martians are born, get their signifiers, receive Nah Nohtek and are under onus to their tribe until they die. Also he talks about about showing their feet to their mates and copulating, thus completing the cycle of life.
The one thing Croach would like humans to know is that that humans taste terrible to Martian palates and they don't wish to eat us.
Segel asks about onus, and Sparks says that it's complicated and it's hard to explain. Croach says he is still working of his tribe's onus, but also has personal onus to Sparks as well.
The next question is about the craziest adventure Sparks and Croach had had together. Sparks relays a story of how, during a space train robbery, Piston Pete, a robot outlaw, had a beep-boop robot with him. After Pete was shot, nobody could understand the beep-boop robot. One of the human passengers could speak beep-boop but not that dialect, so there was a lot of confusion. This happened during Croach's first cycle of onus, a long time ago.
Sparks also mentions getting inside-outed, Mercury and all the other animals being able to talk, and getting body-switched as other crazy adventures.
Segel asks about The Red Plains Rider. Sparks attempts to answer and says that their relationship is "fluid", and would be willing to "give her a badge" (aka have a relationship) if she wanted one. Segel says it was directed to Croach, and Croach says he and Red are physiologically incompatible.
Segel asks what message Sparks has for the kids listening. Sparks says to learn what's right, and do that. To help you do that, get a grownup to show you how to shoot guns to get rid of bad guys. Maybe someday you'll meet Sparks Nevada, Marshal on Mars.
Notes
- The interview is slightly longer here than on the actual episode of This American Wife.
Interview with Frank and Sadie Doyle
This is a special episode of Beyond Belief recorded for This American Wife that was released as episode #38.2 of the Thrilling Adventure Hour. The episode is done in interview format, with in-character answers provided by Frank and Sadie Doyle.
Audio
"Interview with Frank and Sadie Doyle" on SoundCloud
Cast
- Frank Doyle - Paul F. Tompkins
- Sadie Doyle - Paget Brewster
- Robert Segel - Eric Martin
- Melissa Block - Jen Goldberg
Frank and Sadie answer questions about how they met, their past experiences with the supernatural, their drinking, and Sadie's favorite words.
Sadie's first experiences with the ghosts was her grandparents, who visited her after their deaths to read her bedtime stories (although she didn't realize they were ghosts at the time). Growing up, she split time between London and Connecticut in boarding schools and, after that, university. She "dated dangerously" during that time.
Frank's first experiences with the supernatural was his encounter with Nightmares the Clown (featured in more detail in Wishing Hell). This experience lead him to leave his small Maine town and seek sanctuary with the church, where he learnt to perform exorcisms (and how to hold his liquor) (featured in more detail in Nuns the Word). Eventually he "grew tired of the church's dogma" and joined up with other supernatural specialists, Pterodactyl Jones and Red Wolf Mendles. After an unspecified incident caused the break up of their group, Frank spent a few years drinking heavily and "picking fights with more ghosts than deserved it", but this dark period in his life ended when he met Sadie.
They met during a séance gone wrong. Sadie's boyfriend at the time, Bobo Brubaker had aspirations to be a big hitter in the supernatural world like Frank was, but he was in reality a conman, setting up phony séances for trust fund kids. Sadie's natural abilities congured a real spectre, and Frank was called in to push the spectre back from whence it came. It was love at first sight, and every sight since then.
Frank and Sadie get their alcohol delivered by someone who looks just like actor Ralph Bellamy.
Sadie's favourite words is: dinosaur (also: doodle, flimsy, blueberry, taxi, quibble). Her least favourite word is: chart (it's not fun to say or to see).
Notes
- This podcast was originally released as episode #30 of the Thrilling Adventure Hour. It was re-released to the RSS feed on January 25, 2014 to correct the fact that it had disappeared from the feed during the show's move to Nerdist Industries.
Interview with Banjo and Gummy
Audio
"Interview with Banjo and Gummy" on SoundCloud
Cast
- Banjo Bindlestuff - Craig Cackowski
- Gummy - Hal Lublin
- Robert Segel - Eric Martin
Description
Notes
- This podcast was originally released as episode #40 of the Thrilling Adventure Hour. It was re-released to the RSS feed on January 25, 2014 to correct the fact that it had disappeared from the feed during the show's move to Nerdist Industries.
Continuity
- This American Wife is episodes 38.1, 38.2, and 40 of the Thrilling Adventure Hour. There is some confusion about the numbers of these episodes because they were podcast right around the time when the show moved to the Nerdist podcast network, and so the RSS feed for the podcast was changed.
- The prior podcast episode before the Interview with Sparks and Croach is Beyond Belief - Chitty Chitty Bang Bang You're Dead (TAH #37).
- The next podcast episode after the Interview with Banjo and Gummy is Tales from the Black Lagoon - The Search for Marnie Bennett part 1 (TAH #41).