Geronimo Jack's Beard

I have been meaning to write about the Geronimo Jack's Beard podcast since I listened to the first edition after the season 6 premiere as it is a Lost highlight of my week and they make my walk to work more enjoyable. For those of you who don't know anything about these podcasts they are produced and performed by Jorge Garcia (Hurley in Lost) and his girlfriend Bethany Shady (also known as Sidekick 22). Instead of being reviews of the aired episodes the main bulk of the podcast are recorded when Garcia gets his script for the episode of Lost that they are filming and they discuss the episode in this sense rather in the recorded version that we see on the TV. The aired episodes are spoken about in both the introduction and the conclusions of the podcast as these segments are recorded just prior to and just after the episode has aired so sometimes events that are discussed in the podcast never make it in to the final version of the episode, bonus deleted scenes if you will through the form of discussion. Though sometimes this makes me think that I have missed stuff in the episodes such as the much talked about puking in this weeks podcast that never made it in the final episode or that Nestor Carbonell had drunk some fairly dirty water that also never made it to the final cut. The brilliant thing about the podcasts is that just like fans of Lost who have no involvement with the show both Garcia and Sidekick 22 also theorise and wonder what on earth is going on. It is really great to hear someone who is so enthusiastic about his job and the fun that both of them seem to have whilst discussing this show is a welcoming sight (or sound in this case). I also like that Sidekick 22 sometimes doesn't sugar coat some plot points that occur and reminds me of one of my friends that I watch the show with. This podcast is funny, entertaining and gives some great Lost behind the scenes information whether it be about the process of filming or from the behind the scenes pictures that are posted on the Geronimo Jack's Beard blog. There have also been two special guests so far this season; Michael Emerson discussing the episode Dr Linus and Nestor Carbonell discussing this weeks terrific episode Ab Aeterno and hopefully there will be more like this for the final half of the season (I'm rooting for Ken Leung).

It really is worth a listen to and is available at iTunes and both Jorge Garcia and Bethany Shady have other blogs that are also worth a read with Shady also being a writer of both childrens books and some really excellent short stories (my personal favourite being 'Unwanted Donation' parts 1 and 2).