Hello from the Hallowoods · William A. Wellman

Episode 185 - Stands

March 19, 2025·45 min·4 clips

A rock star who tried to save the world watches his daughter die and wonders if his revolution came too late.

You stood for something once. The cold open stays with a musician who turned rebellion into stadium purpose, convinced that noise, solidarity, and a righteous crowd could loosen Botulus Corporation's hold. It didn't. Years pass, the world rots, friends die in the north, and a daughter is taken by the doom she once resisted. The dead come back too, which sounds kinder than it feels. Their faces make love, memory, and survival harder to sort out, not easier. Then the episode pulls back into doctrine. The narrator asks whether humanity keeps picturing one final sacred battle, then drains the glory out of that idea. Flesh changes quietly. Genetic sequence, species ascent, and the life under the Hallowoods become the real battlefield. Decay looks almost tender, which is somehow worse. Beside that slow change, Marilmar's plan to implode half the planet and raise the spring starts to feel like mercy with teeth. Euretzi waits at the center of the second half, spent beside the Countess after the knights of St. Loras, the East Wind's sinking, and Mort's rescue from the depths. Her past is still burning: the covenant with Who Guards a Thousand Suns, demon hunts, Rick Rounds near ruined Liberty. Survival has a bill, and this episode lets you feel it. Even sitting still, she feels one breath away from pursuit. The music keeps after everyone. Piano, fiddle, and drum hang in the black pines, making the fight between life and death feel unfinished. The farewell lands wry, with lemonade sellers whose roots are where feet should be: domestic, absurd, and still predatory.

As heard by us

A bleak, lavish reckoning with conviction after the world refuses to change.

The episode tracks a once rebellious musician as old conviction runs into a world that has not budged. The Botulus Corporation remains in place, friends die, a daughter dies, and the dead come back wearing familiar faces, so love and fear end up sharing the same room.

Read the full review in PlayNext →

Why you'd press play

Play this for a gothic reckoning where rebellion, grief, and the dead returning all collide.

Read the full recommendation in PlayNext →

Listen to the show on

Apple Podcasts Spotify

Play clips from this episode More from Hello from the Hallowoods